


Drink Up, Dreamers

by Mab (Mab_Browne)



Category: Hyakujitsu no Bara | Maiden Rose
Genre: Apocalypse, M/M, Unhappy Ending, implied death of main characters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-23
Updated: 2017-09-23
Packaged: 2019-01-04 09:26:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12166131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mab_Browne/pseuds/Mab
Summary: “What have you done?” Taki demanded.“Nothing useful, my master; the story of my life when I come to think of it.”Apocafic. Making your favourite characters suffer means you love them just that much, honestly.





	Drink Up, Dreamers

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by Peter Gabriel's Here Comes The Flood which is not, of course, actually about a literal flood. Apocafic, I should be sorry but I'm not, etc etc.

Taki woke to a headache, nausea and roaring fury. He swallowed convulsively several times, fighting back the revolt of his gorge, and then leaned forward to shout into Klaus’s ear. If he could have spat venom like a snake, he would have.

“What have you done?” he demanded.

Klaus gestured – Taki saw the radio set. He set it upon himself, and repeated the question.

“What have you done, Klaus? What have you done?”

Klaus’s voice was familiarly distorted by the set, but still he sounded a stranger to Taki. “Nothing useful, my master; the story of my life when I come to think of it.”

“Set us down,” Taki demanded. The moon filled even more of the late afternoon sky and the entire side window as a result; it was more grey and dirty than pale, despite the daylight. Taki averted his eyes and glared at the back of Klaus’s head while he fought a sickening sense of betrayal.

“I can’t.” Klaus shrugged his shoulders. He wore no flight jacket, only his usual uniform jacket. On the ground it had been an unseasonably warm day, and the jacket had been too much. At whatever altitude this was, it was presumably as useless at keeping him warm as Taki’s own jacket. He controlled a shudder.

“Yes, you can. Do as I say!”

“You don’t understand, Taki.” Klaus’s voice shook. “Look down.”

There was only ocean to be seen, blue in the sun but dulled by the shadow of the moon that hung so hugely in the sky.

“Take us back.” It came out low between gritted teeth, but it hurt his throat like a scream.

Klaus laughed. Taki had never heard such a sound from him before; he’d known Klaus distressed and intemperate but never like this. “I would if I could.” The plane banked, and he pointed below to what looked like a line of reef. “I’m not sure, -“he laughed again, shorter but just as uncontrolled - “I’m a little out of my normal reckoning, but I think that’s your Lotus Peak.”

Taki said nothing. The water was occasionally dotted with something – debris perhaps. It was small, whatever it was. He shut his eyes and leaned against the seat in front of him, head pressed painfully against its frame, overcome with memory and grief. The moon growing in size as it drew closer and closer. The urgent sharing of intelligence between allies and the hiding of truth also; the ongoing futile battles between enemies. The shouts of alarm, and Klaus’s hands at his throat and the emptiness of unconsciousness.

Klaus suspected those rocks barely above the water were the Lotus Peak - the sacred mountain, Taki’s country’s highest point. No wonder Taki was so cold.

“You should have let me die with them!” he cried.

“I’m sorry! But they let me. Your people let me. They wanted you to have a chance, because we hoped that there’d be something left. Somebody left.”

Taki had no more words, and Klaus continued, calmly detached now, almost dreamy. Taki suspected he would have spoken even if alone. 

“One wave came from the west, and I thought, that’s bad, but then I looked to the east and thought it was a grey sea mist at first. I climbed, I just climbed, and it did too, and I only just got above it in time.” The dreaminess shattered in another jarring laugh. “Buck up, Taki. You’ll have your chance.”

“What do you mean?”

“Do you see any land?”

“No.”

“Well, then,” Klaus said, with inappropriate cheer. “A flying boat this is not. We’ve been in the air maybe half an hour, and this is a tidy little machine but we’re straining its service ceiling. Another three to four hours at best and we’ll be going down whether I like it or not.”

“I see.” Taki rose and stretched forward as best he could – the headphones were unwieldy with their heads so close, and he laid one arm across Klaus’s chest, and felt the shivers. “You’re cold.”

“So are you. We are at nearly four thousand meters right now,” Klaus said wryly before his voice trembled. “I think. We could be.” He swallowed and spoke more normally. “I would have grabbed some flight gear, but there wasn’t the time.” He took one hand from the controls and laid it tightly across Taki’s arm. “I don’t know what to do.”

“Tell me our options,” Taki said, as if they were in the situation room looking at a map, and it worked. He felt Klaus somehow steady under his hands and that steadied him in his turn.

“Concerning direction, I think I can navigate by guesswork and the sun enough that we circle your country until we go down. Or we could pick a direction and look for dry land. So much water here, it stands to reason there must be dry land somewhere it didn’t used to be.”

“West or east?” Taki said.

Klaus paused a moment. “Not west,” he said, and Taki nodded. “Stay or explore, my master?”

The option of seeing how the western lands were drowned or wrecked had been rejected by Klaus. Taki looked at the water beneath them, covering everything and everyone he had ever loved, bar one, and said softly, “Circle.”

Klaus laughed but it was gentle, not distraught as it was before. “As you command.” He took a breath. “At some point we run out of fuel. We can dive or we can try to ditch.”

“Ditch to what purpose?”

Klaus shrugged. “Those are our options. I’d prefer not to ditch, if it’s the same to you. I’ve no fancy to be adrift and become separated from you.” When Taki made no answer he turned his head to look him in the face. “Taki?”

Oh, this was shaming. Klaus had made his declaration, loyal as always, and Taki balked at a little truth telling that could hurt no-one except himself. Cowardly, and not for the first time.

“When I was very small I nearly drowned. In one of the ornamental pools.”

“Escaped your nurses did you? You mean you had to develop that sense of duty?” The teasing deepened into something earnest. “So we dive then, if that’s the only option. I don’t mind.”

Taki swallowed. “I would be more afraid of drowning somewhere enclosed. I remember… I was tangled in my clothes, it’s the clearest memory of it.” So ridiculous to have to almost declaim this, when it should have been whispered in a hush, but the engine noise made it necessary.

Klaus’s smile was affectionate. “I’m a good pilot and there’ll still be light. Trust me to manage things better than that.”

“Yes,” Taki said, and this time it was barely more than a whisper. It was awkward but he managed to kiss Klaus, to taste the cup of his mouth without doubt or hesitation. The westering sun and the glaring moon were the only witnesses left now, after all.


End file.
